Gastronomy 101

Okay, I know I know I know I know. It seems like I have abandoned this thing. I have been trying to do this post for almost a month now. But I spend my entire day writing about food, and then when I am done .... well, once a week I have to write about food some more. When I sit down to write on this blog, well, it doesn't feel like fun anymore, it feels like work. And in the past few weeks, I've had a lot of stuff going on ... birthdays galore, and friends in need, and between that and the work I've been exhausted a lot, with not a lot of energy left over. But I don't want to abandon this blog, so I'm changing the plot a little bit. While I do have to write about food all day, one thing I don't have to do is photograph it. I have been thinking and I think I may take this opportunity to practice my photography skills and try to improve. My pictures are not exactly masterpieces, but maybe with some work, they can get better. So for a while, I think I am going to n...

Guys, I know I have not been posting to this blog much recently. At the moment I am not only doing work that involves writing about food and the foodservice industry all day, but I am also taking a food writing class. Between the two of these things, the thought of also writing about food on my blog on a daily basis is just exhausting. I still plan to keep it up however, as I've been gathering up posts. It just won't be as frequent. The best way to be updated when I write something is join my RSS feed on the side there. Then you can just check for updates there and not have to keep looking here disappointedly as I know y'all are doing. (Refresh! Refresh! ... damn, still no new post!) But an exciting thing that's happening is that I'm getting very close to the end of my wine book. I am in the final section now. How exciting! Now we are learning about how to collect and keep wines. If you decide you want to become a collector, then you will probably be keeping your w...

So my dear friend, Ms. Vaguely Urban , sprung on me this meme, the purpose of which is to write your own memoir in only six words. She herself set the bar very high , so it's taken me quite a while to deliberate on this subject. As it turns out, my life is best described in phrases of five or seven words, and not really in phrases of six words. But I came up with something. Not the greatest, so I have added illustrations to make it seem better. So here it is, my memoir: KT's MEMOIR (in six words) Appears harmless, but ... It's a TRAP!

J. and I had a giant feast at Providence for our sixth anniversary. Read about it on la.foodblogging !

It's easy to remember where Port comes from - it comes from Portugal, of course. But Port is not a time honored traditional wine of the Portugues - it was invented by the British. Since Britain was always at war with France, they ended up purchasing wine from Portugal. To make sure the wine was stable enough to make it from Portugal to England, they fortified the wine with brandy and voila - Port was invented. The first Port house was opened by the British in 1670. While Port comes from the city of Oporto, which is on the sea, the grapes are actually grown inland in the Douro Valley. The wine is also fermented and fortified there, and then sent to Oporto where it is finished and matured. There is no particular grape for Port, and it may be made from any of 80 different varieties. There are may imposter Ports from other parts of the world--the way to tell whether a Port is authentically from Portugal is to look for the word "porto" on the label. There are several styles of...

It's probably pretty clear to anyone who reads this blog that I am not a professional chef, nor even a particularly good one. I don't make up fantastic, creative and beautiful recipes from my own head, nor do I even exercise more than the most basic cooking skills usually. Sometimes I take on a project and when I do I need a recipe. So how DO I plan and make my meals on a daily basis? Well, I'm pretty embarrassed to let you peek behind the scenes on this process, but I feel I owe it to anyone who bothers to read this to be completely honest, and also to let you get to know me a little so that you can decide whether or not the time is right to never read this blog, since I clearly do not know what I am talking about. So how do I cook, when I have to fend for myself? Well, my number one trick is to make it LOOK nice, so that even if it's not good, I can pretend to the world at large that what I am eating is incredibly AWESOME. It's not always possible, but it's wh...

February 23 was "Open That Bottle" night - a night on which you are supposed to open that bottle of wine you have been saving for ... something, but you don't know what. To stop people from the danger of saving a bottle for too long, this night was invented to give you an excuse. Because there are certain dangers that arise from saving a bottle of wine for too long. It will acquire a mythical status in your mind and you will put it off and put it off and perhaps you will put it off so long that the person you wish to drink it with is no longer around, as in the incredibly sad story I heard on NPR one time, or the wine has turned to vinegar (also in that same incredibly sad story - I told you it was SAD) , or perhaps you end up drinking it alone and pathetic out of a styrofoam cup in a fast food restaurant. You never know! If you missed this year's occasion - do not fret! It happens every year on the last Saturday in February. Probably whatever wine you would have o...